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Her wrists. Oh god, her wrists, open and weeping and oozing gold.
Funnily enough, Violet remembers very little from that night. That dreadful night, with its fat tallow candles sputtering sparks, and the tracks of fresh bullet holes smoking in the floorboards, and the blood (oh god the blood) that had poured from Silco’s chest, pump, pump, pumping, as he mumbled those last venomous words into Powder’s ringing eardrums.
She remembers the way Powder had looked at her. Content. Almost at peace. Awake and awash and unperturbed, like waves that never break upon a glassy shore. She remembers the way her sister had sauntered to her chair, eyes gleaming blue and violet, one clear and flecked with light, the other backed by blood-soaked granite, and how she had flopped into its leather confines, both eyes flashing obsidian, her lips twisting into that lioness sneer.
She remembers feeling her chest roil. The first green shoots of grief stirring in her stomach.
The rest comes in snatches. The rocket. The explosion. The laughter. How Jinx had crushed a smoke pellet and then pelted into the shadows, leaving behind a trail of gleeful giggles. She remembers trying to call for help, how her shaking fingers had kept missing the goddamn numbers, and the agonising silence on the other end as Enforcers were dispatched towards Piltover’s smouldering hall.
She remembers —no, she can still see— the way that Caitlyn had sunk to her knees. One hand clasped over her mouth, the other clawed over her breast and spewing blood. She can still picture her eyes streaming, her chest heaving, how she had watched helplessly as salt and iron mixed down the front of Caitlyn’s shirt.
How her eyes, always so bright and so bold and so beautiful, had turned a glassy grey.
Caitlyn hadn’t screamed. Wept but barely cried, uttering a low keening sound that sounded vaguely supplicatory and entirely inhuman. Once, she had sobbed, a small strangled hiss squeezed through a throat that was too tight, when a section of the tower collapsed and crashed into the burning wreckage below.
Otherwise, she had been silent. No noise, no cursing. Far, far, too still.
Violet’s heart ached. Ached for Powder, ached for Caitlyn, ached for Mylo’s straw-stuffed legacy with the bullet hole still smoking in its forehead. She watched Caitlyn wrestle with her grief, so different from the roiling emotions bubbling over in her own chest, and the pale perverted contrast unnerved her.
So, she led Caitlyn back inside. Tore a strip off the bottom of her shirt and bandaged Caitlyn’s wrists, which wept and oozed into her trembling lap. Press tight for me, she remembers saying, press tight onto these and don’t let go. Will you do that for me?
Caitlyn had nodded, with that same empty look dominating her eyes. Violet remembered thinking that perhaps Caitlyn hadn’t heard, that maybe the stars had closed another door to her, but then Caitlyn had pushed shaking fingers to her wrists, and touched her forehead to Violet’s shoulder.
The room had gone quiet. The candles, burned down into their recesses, spat their final sparks.
And then, maybe it was the shock, or the blood, or the fire that continued to ravage the skyline, but Caitlyn had shuddered, uttered a single inaudible moan, and then passed out, as if all the adrenaline that was keeping her awake had suddenly evaporated into the night air.
After that, Violet remembers very little. Carrying Caitlyn down the stairs. Patting her (and then Caitlyn’s) pockets for change to rent a motel room. Stripping off Caitlyn’s clothes and hauling her into bed.
It was only afterwards, when Caitlyn lay restless under a thin grey blanket, and Violet sat slumped on the end of the bed, that her memory flickers back to life. She remembers the room, cold and cramped and covered in filth, with her mangled gauntlets heaped in the corner and Caitlyn’s clothes folded neatly on top. She remembers the tiny desk lamp perched in the corner, with its dust-caked bulb and dim guttering light, that somehow made the shadows appear longer, the monsters stand taller, that drew stretches of the night sky deeper into her chest but left everything living and bright outside.
She remembers standing up and walking to the window. How cold the floor was. How much her legs ached. She remembers peering through cracked glass into the blackened clouds, into the stars that cowered piteously behind fire and foam-crested smoke, and how she had contemplated on life, on how long it seemed to go, on how little of it she had left to give and how much more of it she dreaded to take, and how all the colours of the world —pinpricks of blue and black-backed purple— had burst like muzzle flashes behind her eyelids. She remembers feeling how her knees had ached, how her stomach had churned, the twinging of regret and nothing else banging behind her ribs, and the way her chest had risen and fallen but never seemed to get any fuller, like she was being crushed, condensed, reduced into a pinprick of black-backed grey, drowning in the endless gaps between stars that she could not, could no longer, could never again, touch.
She remembers that moment, dreadful and eternal, and how it was then, only then, amidst the drawn-quartered remains of her own smouldering heart, that she was able to give life to that one terrible thought; the one that had always gnawed inside her but that she could never bring herself to say.
This is all your fault. You always bring this on the people you love. Her knees buckle. Her hollow gauntlets leave bloodstains on Caitlyn’s uniform.
And you’re never strong enough to protect them.
*
Caitlyn’s recovery was… slow. Physically, she healed well. Her wounds, endured from the dirty wineglass and Jinx’s own sadistic glee, were shallow despite their dramatic appearance, and two weeks of stitches and antibiotics were all the doctors needed to prescribe.
Her mental health, on the other hand—
She had been called in to identify the body. A useless task, if they could ever think of one — both Jayce and Mrs Kiramman had been incinerated in the explosion, and not even the most filial daughter could recognise their mother’s skeleton. Caitlyn left with a fresh wound bleeding behind her breast, and the Enforcers fell back onto charred teeth and dental records.
They couldn’t have done that earlier?! Violet had raged, once Caitlyn had gotten off the phone with the Enforcers. They had to call you in first?
Caitlyn hadn’t said anything. Just put her hand against Violet’s chest and drew her close, pressing her chin against Violet’s collarbone. Her shoulders shook but she didn’t cry, though whether she refused to or simply couldn’t— neither could say.
(sometimes violet forgets that not all love needs to be angry)
Violet had stopped cursing. Didn’t know what to say, didn’t know what else to do. She looked down into Caitlyn’s eyes, those beautiful full eyes, and she wept at how empty they were, how glossy and glozed and interminably grey, and god, oh God, how her soul ached. The corners of the night sky dug deeper behind her breast, and she pushed her lips into Caitlyn’s hair, eyes shut and bursting with pinpricks, tears wetting Caitlyn’s scalp.
In the stillness of her mind, all she could hear was one thought. One thought, that same thought, roiling and boiling behind her ribs.
Caitlyn’s fingers are warm against her, but even they can’t penetrate the starless sky.
*
In the end, Caitlyn chose to decline her mother’s position. Her father, God bless him, had never wanted to be a Councillor, and Caitlyn knew where her place lay, so the Kiramman family withdrew from the Council, and Caitlyn went back to being an Enforcer.
The first few months were challenging. Jinx’s assassination of the Council had left a complex power vacuum, and Piltover melted into a political warzone as ambitious parties vied for a seat at the table. In the weeks that followed, a myriad of hasty campaigns were mounted; old families coming out of the woodwork, new families stepping up to the plinth, all armed with speeches and sweatshop-soaked stationary. Thankfully, only four assassinations were attempted —of these, two were successful.
More than once, Caitlyn thanked her father for letting her step away.
(it’s what your mother would have wanted, he had said. and they had cried, and held each other, and tobias touched the locket that he now always wore around his throat)
But eventually, eventually, the carnage settled down. Time, in its infinite wisdom, elected six new councillors, all brazen and bold with shining white teeth, and the world, in its infinite patience, ticked eternally on.
Violet had left to find Jinx. She hadn’t said she would, didn’t need to say she would, just showed up at Caitlyn’s door with an old backpack and some older leads.
(caitlyn had smiled. touched violet’s arm and kissed her on the forehead. be safe, violet remembers her saying. if you survive this, come back to me)
(so, she was)
(and, she did)
*
Violet had never seen such depravity in her life. In their infinite greed, the chem-barons had torn Zaun to pieces trying to claim the most luxuriant land, and the production of Shimmer, now crippled without Silco’s oversight, leaked in ebbs and flows throughout the Undercity. The sun, no further than it been twelve months ago, shone dimmer now.
All of it was… in ruins. Ravaged by Shimmer, either not enough or too much, everything around lying dead or otherwise dying. Violet remembers flickering lamps and glass underfoot and rainwater dripping through mouldy rafters. Emerald firelights at night and nothing else during the day. Everyone she had met was scared —of the light, of her fists, of her— or otherwise too covered with scars to take notice of one more pissed-off Zaunite.
She had left her gauntlets back in Piltover. They were too conspicuous —if she had walked into a bar swinging those around, she would never walk out. But that was alright. A part of her had missed fighting bare-fisted. How free it felt, how weightless and strong. As if she was fighting with air, wind and force and raw unbridled will, feeling cloth and mishappen jawbone shatter beneath her knuckles. As it stands, she probably couldn’t handle a Shimmer mech, but she could damn well take on a leery-eyed bargoer.
(she learned how to use a rifle too, though she often missed. never quite patient enough to line up the shot)
One night she does remember, and she remembers it well. It had been nearing midnight, the moon pendulous and thick, and Violet was stumbling through a maze of back-door streets. Half-pissed, high, desperately looking for somewhere to take a leak. Regular ol’ night.
After stepping over a few sleeping beggars, she finally found a suitable alleyway: narrow and dark, but serviceable. When she turned in, two people were already there. They might have been lovers —you could never tell down here— but they were thin as kindling, see-through like wafers, and arguing heatedly. At their feet shone four vials of Shimmer. As Violet watched, one of them —the thinner one— kissed his companion and then pushed her to the ground, stamping on her head until her toes stopped twitching. His foot had stuck to her hair afterwards. Then, he had gathered up the vials, looked Violet dead in the eye, and guzzled them all down.
Violet had never run so fast in her life. She can still hear the roar of his transformation, the shattering of bone and crumbling brick as his muscles burst inside that cramped alleyway. He had taken one lumbering step forward and she had sprinted off, wincing as her forearm dragged deeply into a protruding nail, all traces of alcohol beading out onto her forehead.
For her efforts, she was spared the final gurglings as the addict tore the nearby beggars to pieces.
(she wasn’t spared the crackling though. the screams)
Despite everything, Violet never managed to find anything. A dank and dimly lit year had passed and she had nothing to show for it. Countless bars upturned. Endless smugglers interrogated. Nothing. No one. The trail had gone cold, blanched between her shaking fingertips, and at the end of it, all she had left was a fistful of half-forgotten giggles, and fitful feckless dreams of obsidian-backed eyes.
So, after heavy deliberation and irreversible liver damage, she decided to press pause. Give it a few months, see if Jinx will come to her. She threw her backpack —now little more than frayed stitching— into the corner of some seedy pub, downed the last three shots of whatever ungodly spirit she had ordered, and made her way out of the Lanes.
Back to the Kiramman crest.
Back to her.
Sorry, Tobias had said gently when he opened the door, Caitlyn isn’t here. She moved out.
Oh, Violet remembers saying, though she forgets how deeply her shoulders had slumped.
Wait. Tobias rummaged around inside and handed her a slip of paper. That’s her new address. And his eyes, bold and just as beautiful as his daughter’s, gleamed brighter than the locket latched at his throat. I’m sure she’ll be delighted to see you.
(he was, of course, right)
*
When Caitlyn opened the door, she didn’t say anything. Didn’t need to say anything. Just drew Violet close, who went gratefully, and pressed her lips to Violet’s forehead.
You stayed safe, she whispered at last.
I did.
Good. I saved a room for you.
*
Caitlyn had changed during Violet’s absence. Her back, still framed within that same bird-like posture, had broadened, cords of muscle twining down her triceps and forearms. A small purple tattoo —Violet was too distracted to look any closer— crested over the tip of her collarbone. Once, Violet had accompanied Caitlyn to shooting practice, and watched transfixed as Caitlyn had unloaded her cartridge into the golden bullseyes. Her deft fingers, working masterfully around the trigger and hinges, slung smoking shells out of her rifle as if they were liquid, shoulder blades rippling under the fluorescent lights.
It had made Violet blush. She remembers fingering the barrel of her gun nervously.
You’re a good shot, she had commented afterwards.
You already know what I’m going to say to that, Caitlyn had laughed, slinging her arm around Violet’s waist.
And you’re very handsy too. What else happened while I was away?
Not much. And Caitlyn had knocked her hip playfully against Violet’s. I just missed you, that’s all.
*
There were cold nights too. Dark ones. Nights where the sky was thick with clouds, pitching and boiling and impenetrably dense, and Violet, drowning in that terrible singular thought, was reminded of just how starless the heavens could be.
It’s then, head between her thighs and brain spinning —though whether from too much or not enough air she could never say—that she thinks about Jinx. The laughter. The chair. How so many —too many— pinpricks were bursting before her eyes, resplendent in their violet and obsidian-backed lights.
She presses a hand to her breast. Sucks air in through clenched teeth, tries to turn her thoughts towards something else. Something warm. Something good. Something that isn’t the pain of failing the only family she’s ever held, over and over, endless and everlasting, a whirlpool of despair hinged across a singular admonition.
On those nights, her head never seems to stop spinning. And the spaces, deep and dark between dead or dying stars, dig deeper into the gaps behind her ribs.
*
Some nights, Caitlyn would come to her. Wake to the sound of her crying, pad softly across hardwood floors, hold her and kiss her forehead and say nothing and feel everything.
Those nights were warmer.
Violet would look up from where her chin rested on Caitlyn’s breast and peer into her eyes. She would notice the shimmering in her irises. The gleam behind dilated pupils. How the grey, once so dominant and so barren, had faded, softened into silk, thinned into the gentle lapping wash of old scar healed over.
They were heartbreakingly, soul-achingly blue.
And Violet’s heart, drowning in dark and distant waters, thumped harder behind her ribs.
*
You’ve got a new scar, Caitlyn had said, pointing to the thin jagged line that sneered over the bulge of Violet’s forearm. Is that from Zaun?
Oh. This. Violet cringed at the memory of those guttural screams —the sound of unwashed flesh tearing. She rubbed the ridge thoughtfully. Yeah, it’s new. A dirty nail sticking out of the wall.
You must have been moving fast to drag your entire arm against it.
Yeah, I was in a bit of a hurry. Her eyes flashed with sorrow. I don’t really want to talk about it.
Alright, we won’t. Caitlyn leaned forward and heaped more salad onto Violet’s plate, the way Vander used to when Violet was little, and her smile bloomed with gentle warmth. Violet examined the lines of Caitlyn’s face, searching for the tiny furrows of pity that people always directed towards her, and found none.
This was what she loved about Caitlyn. Caitlyn cared for Violet, protected her, rose above and beyond what she was expected to do. But never out of pity. Never out of duty.
Always, ceaselessly, out of love. Respect and compassion and sheer unadulterated love, resplendent and reactive and so uproariously real that it made Violet’s heart swell beyond the confines of the night sky.
Caitlyn stood up to fetch some water from the sink. When she returned, she laid a glass next to Violet’s plate and kissed her on the forehead, pressing a light fingertip to the corner of Violet’s scar.
Tears pricked into Violet’s eyes. She thought she might cry —though every instinct screamed at her not too— and she marvelled at how full she felt, how weightless and strong, how her body drew so much protection from two binary points of singular contact.
She swiped her eyes hurriedly. She hoped Caitlyn didn’t notice.
(caitlyn did, of course, though she didn’t say anything. only let her lips stay for a heartbeat longer)
When Caitlyn had resumed her seat, Violet cleared her throat meaningfully.
Speaking of new things, she began, some things have changed about you.
Caitlyn looked up. Such as?
Well, I could have sworn you didn’t look quite as fit before I left.
Caitlyn laughed —god, how it made Violet’s chest ache. It’s the Enforcer duties, she replied, they keep you on your feet.
I didn’t realise that walking built up your back and shoulders too.
Ah. I may have also started going to the gym.
Oh? Violet raised an eyebrow playfully. She had felt the tip in the conversation, the subtle rolling of the ball into her court. You never went before.
Well, and here Caitlyn had looked down at her spaghetti, it wasn’t just for me. She pushed a meatball distractedly around her plate. I was starting to anticipate that you would be coming home soon too.
Oh.
Caitlyn’s cheeks had flamed, burned redder than the glass of wine she tipped hurriedly to her lips. She turned to look out the window.
To her credit, Violet had responded with remarkable grace. Hid her grin inside her collar. Bit back the teasing remarks. Just laid her fork down, pushed the bowl of parmesan towards Caitlyn, and squeezed Caitlyn’s fingers when she reached out to grab it. For what little my opinion is worth, Violet had said, I think you’ve done well.
And Caitlyn’s eyes, backlit by the moon and suffused with more stars than Violet’s empty chest could handle, had sparkled. Gleamed. Brilliant and so bold and infinitely, soul-achingly blue.
Violet’s breath had hitched. She struggled, wrestled, couldn’t find the words.
God, she said at last. Forgive me, Cupcake, but you are so so beautiful.
Caitlyn blushed further.
And the warmth of her smile, lingering on Violet’s forehead, bloomed throughout the starless sky.